52 Books in 52 weeks – July

I had a great time reading this month. I actually think I read more books than this, but writing this up now I cannot remember them so they could not have been that good I guess.

Here is the list 🙂

Number	Title	Author
27 – Jun 30 – Jul 6	The Scorch Trials	Dashner, James
28 – Jul 7-13	Death Cure	Dashner, James
29 – Jul 14-20	Rebound	Mathis Thompson, Nikki
30 – Jul 21-27	Resilient	Mathis Thompson, Nikki
31 – Jul 28 – Aug 3	The Fault in our Stars	Green, John

I had the BEST month of reading!!!

The Scorch Trials – James Dashner

YAY it came into the Library finally! I liked this sequel, but nowhere near as much as the original. I am not sure why to be honest, but I just didn’t feel the same about the story, I felt like the person in charge of WICKED must be losing their mind because the trials were a monstrous thing to do to people. Don’t get me wrong guys I still loved it, but just not as much as the original J Also I think Theresa is a crazy person!  

 

 

 

 

Death Cure – James Dashner

Here we go, this was much better than the Scorch Trials. Like the first book I devoured these pages very quickly and never felt like I was skimming the pages. The story was meaty and had twists and turns, everything about the struggle and the craziness going on felt right – even the horrible twists that occurred I thought to myself, ‘Yes, if this was a reality this would probably happen, people would behave like this’. I did love the whole monitoring behaviours etc. part of WICKED, but hated psycho Ratman, still hate Theresa, couldn’t warm up to her. I liked the ending.

 

 

Rebound – Nikki Mathis Thompson

This book was recommended to me by an awesome blogger Cellulitelooksbettertan in her post ‘Of Foodgasms and Muff-Fro’s’ check it out and her out because she is awesome, please make sure to give her great comment 🙂 !

This book, what can I say about it, I just loved it. The name of the Heroine bothered me for like 2 pages (mainly because I have a thing about weird names where the protagonist has to remind people how to say them, it annoys me. This quite possibly has everything to do with the fact I have spent my life telling people my name is not Cath, or Cathy it is CAT! Like Dog, people!), but I got over it quickly. I loved her friends, this is totally what me and my girlfriend are like and how I love to be with people (when they are not prudes) so I thought it was fantastic. The ending was great, it has been a long time since I was satisfied and at the same time pleasantly surprised by an ending. It is all about her, I don’t want to write about it too much because I try to avoid spoilers so you can go and see for yourselves. 

 

Resilient – Nikki Mathis Thompson

YAY! A number two! The characters were just as full and vibrant as the first book. There were some good times and bad had by all. In the sequel the author manages to add in a lot more interaction with old characters and new without unnecessarily overcrowding the plot which is a difficult thing to do (if you’re interested in other authors that are awesome at this check out Fiona McIntosh and Anne Rice!). I really enjoyed the protagonists personal journey, I loved that when a character f’d up the reactions and fall out were pretty much what you would expect in real life.

I think one reason I loved these books and the protagonist in particular is what the character terms her “inner dialogue” where she talks to herself or has arguments to herself in her head. I do this ALL THE TIME! It was seriously awesome to have someone write a character that does that because it made me feel that perhaps the author herself or someone she knows does it and therefore I am not alone 🙂

The first book and this sequel are totally worth your time check them out!

 

The Fault in our Stars – John Green

I love, love, loved this book, by now you would likely know that I have a thing about reading a book before watching the movie and I am SO glad that I read this book first. I have not seen the movie, but there is just no way it could live up to the book!

I loved that the teens in this movie weren’t typical, I particularly liked the part where they discussed Hazel’s ‘this is not a pipe’ shirt and ‘cancer perks’. There was a lot of depth to these characters, even the ones that weren’t really supposed to have it. There is so much I want to say about how much I liked this book, it was a brilliant surprise for me and I cannot recommend it enough, it is just awesome. I literally could not put it down, I read it within 24 hours and 8.5 of those hours I was working, plus there was some sleep in there somewhere.

And so we go into August… so many books… so little time.

Please feel free to discuss the books below if you have read them. 

Also if you have any recommendations I would be happy to check them out 🙂

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52 Books in 52 weeks – May

I do apologise in advance as I have to admit my last two books this month were shorter than what I would normally read, but to be fair I didn’t realise how short they were until I started reading the series.

Here is the list 🙂

Number	Title	Author
18 – Apr 27 – May 4	Sometimes a Rogue	Putney, Mary Jo
19 – May 5-11	The Maze Runner	Dashner, James
20 – May 12-18	Married with Zombies	Petersen, Jesse
21 – May 19-25	Resurrected	Rice, Morgan
22 – May 26 – Jun 1	Craved	Rice, Morgan

 

Part of the reason I designed and set this task for myself this year was to force me to read books that I wouldn’t normally read as well as books I keep meaning to read, but somehow never get around to reading. Most of the books I read this month fall into one of these categories.

Sometimes a Rogue – Mary Jo Putney

I’m not going to lie; it took me a while to try a “Romance” novel. Why? Because whenever I have read them in the past it was the same story every time, just in different settings with different names; damsel has bad thing happen to her such as getting kidnapped, often the leading man is the kidnapper, but he is misunderstood, he falls for the captive she gets what I always amounted to be Stockholm syndrome AKA falls in love with him too and somehow everything works out after they almost break up a few times. Oh and sometimes for a plot twist she falls pregnant, but doesn’t tell him for some reason. So as you can imagine I went into this with very low expectations and was pleasantly surprised… apparently romance novels sometimes have a damsel who has a spine? The female character Sarah did get kidnapped, but she fought her kidnappers, dressed as a boy to elude them once she had escaped, slept in barns, survived a huge storm at sea during which the boat split into a million pieces, saved the male protagonist and protected his land by shooting invaders. Like I said, pleasantly surprised.

 

The Maze Runner – James Dashner

Finally I got to this book, it has been on my “To Read” list for ages! This novel came out in 2009 and can I just say that it certainly stood up to (and in many cases far exceeded) the quality of YA fiction coming out at that time. I really enjoyed it and will likely see the movie when it comes out later this year, mainly because I am interested to see the Grievers brought to life 🙂 I have already put a hold on the prequel and sequel at the Library, there are a couple of holds on them though so I may be in for a wait 😦

 

 

 

 

Married with Zombies – Jesse Petersen

If you are looking for a gruesome hard-hitting Zombie novel this is not the book for you. I enjoyed this book, I actually laughed out loud a few times and really liked the chapter titles as you went along which combined surviving the Zombie apocalypse with lessons from their marriage counsellor. I liked the offbeat humour in this novel and particularly enjoyed where they sat down and had a conversation about all the movies they had seen to try and put together a list of how to possibly kill Zombies. I also had to laugh when they were filling up on gas and the husband started stealing all the cigarettes because he thought they could be used to trade for goods later on. It was also nice to have a bit of realism in that the power, water and internet didn’t automatically stop because there were Zombies. Worth a read… I am trying to track down the sequel.

 

Resurrected & Craved – Morgan Rice

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

These books are the first two in a YA series by Morgan Rice, they were ok for a Vampire Novel and would likely be snapped up by the target audience, but for someone that grew up on
Anne Rice (quite literally I was reading her novels in my early teens) I was a bit underwhelmed. The characters were pretty well developed for a YA novel and Morgan definitely has the teen-speak down – meaning I have like never seen so many “likes” in one page in like any book in like ever… like.

And so we go into June… so many books… so little time.